Monday, September 30, 2013

While I realize that the data is a
bit dated, the premise still holds. A national survey conducted by the Annenberg
Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania provides us
with some insight regarding Americans understanding of the document that so
many quote, particularly when referring to their right to bear arms and their
right to privacy. This is particularly pertinent in today's partisan
environment where neither side of the political divide, both in Washington and
on Main Street, has any patience for the views held by their political
opponents.

The survey of 1230 adults taken in
September 2011 showed the following:

•only
38 percent could name all three branches of the United States government.

•one
third of respondents could not name a single one of the three branches.

•only
51 percent of Americans knew that a two-thirds majority vote by Congress is
needed to overturn a Presidential veto.

•91
percent of respondents knew that the United States Supreme Court is the highest
court in the United States, however, only 62 percent of respondents knew that
the Supreme Court is responsible for determining whether or not a law is
constitutional.

•only
48 percent of respondents knew that a 5-4 Supreme Court decision has the same
effect as a 9-0 decision.

•only
15 percent of respondents knew that John Roberts was Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court (in an interesting twist, 27 percent knew that Randy Jackson was
a judge on American Idol).

Here are a few questions from the
official U.S. citizenship test and how well respondents did:

•a
respectable 78 percent knew that the first ten amendments to the Constitution
were called the Bill of Rights.

•76
percent knew that the Declaration of Independence established American
independence from Great Britain.

•only
42 percent of respondents knew that jury duty is reserved exclusively for
American citizens.

•a
paltry 13 percent of respondents knew that the Constitution was signed in 1787
with 55 percent stating that it was signed in 1776, the year that the
Declaration of Independence was signed.

"...a 1992 report by the Center for the Study of Communication at
the University of Massachusetts found that while 86% of a random sample of
likely voters knew that the Bush's family dog was named Millie and 89% knew
that Murphy Brown was the TV character criticized by Dan Quayle, only 15% knew
that both candidates favored the death penalty and only 5% knew that both had
proposed cuts in the capital gains tax."

On average, over the past fifty
years, Americans have been able to correctly answer only four out of ten
questions in a political questionnaire and the author suggests that rather
than being uninformed about political issues, Americans are under-informed.
It seems that when the Democrats and Republicans take more distinctive stands
on various key issues, the public can more easily differentiate between the
two.

All that said, research suggests
that when comparing knowledge of national legislatures in Canada, the United
States and the United Kingdom, Americans averaged less than three in ten
correct responses compared to six in ten for the United Kingdom and 9.8 out of
eleven for Canadians.

Research suggests that citizens that
are better informed tend to be more tolerant and are less likely to change
their opinion in the face of misleading information but are more likely to
change their opinion when they are presented with relevant information that
proves their opinion wrong.

In closing, here's a quote from Paul
Blumberg's 1990 paper, The Politics of Ignorance:

"America's embarrassing little secret ... is that vast numbers of Americans
are ignorant, not merely of the specialized details of government which
ordinary citizens cannot be expected to master, but of the most elementary
political facts - information so basic as to challenge the central tenet o f
democratic government itself."

Think about that the next time you
listen to someone's vitriolic and politically polarized commentary on the current state of politics in
America. Perhaps they are speaking from their own ignorance.

2 comments:

In truth, that study gave me some hope. Particularly, this part: "Americans averaged less than three in ten correct responses compared to six in ten for the United Kingdom and 9.8 out of eleven for Canadians."

So basically, the idea of 'people who don't care to know making big decisions." Isn't a regular aspect of humanity and more a regular aspect of Americans.

Or to put it another way: Democracy and giving power to 'the people!' actually can work. It's just not working that well over in the States.

The question though, is why? Why are we unique? Is it due to us believing we don't have to change due to already being 'on the top'? Is there something in the water? Did we experience a brain drain long ago that we never recovered from?

Ill give a perfect example: About 3 weeks ago I was talking with a coworker at one of my part time Jobs(I have 1 full time and 2 part time jobs). She is a student 2nd or 3rd year in college with her major being Political Science focusing on Global Politics. So I figure she would be interesting to talk to about the situation of the possible attack by the US on Bashar al Assad's military. She stated that it was important to attack Syria because they had nuclear weapons and we can not allow they to give the weapon to Al Qaeda. I am asuming anyone reading this will at least have a general idea of who is on what side in the civil war in Syria. But her answer just unscores the complete ignorance of even college educated people in the US.

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About Me

I have been an avid follower of the world's political and economic scene since the great gold rush of 1979 - 1980 when it seemed that the world's economic system was on the verge of collapse. I am most concerned about the mounting level of government debt and the lack of political will to solve the problem. Actions need to be taken sooner rather than later when demographic issues will make solutions far more difficult. As a geoscientist, I am also concerned about the world's energy future; as we reach peak cheap oil, we need to find viable long-term solutions to what will ultimately become a supply-demand imbalance.